DHCP is used to allocate IP addresses and host configuration parameters. DHCP servers assume responsibility to distribute the IP addresses and configuration parameters, and maintain databases for bookkeeping purposes. Examples of such types of databases include, but are not limited to, an address pool, a binding database, and databases containing other known types of information.
In some telecommunication architectures where there are numerous customer hosts to be served, a node relatively close to the customer plays a relay agent role. This role is referred to herein as DHCP agent, which can include a DHCP agent of any kind (e.g., relay agent, intermediate agent or the like) between a DHCP server and a client of the DHCP server. In performing this role, the DHCP agent replaces the hosts' addresses with its own address as the source of the request going upstream to the DHCP server for reasons such as scalability of the architecture. The DHCP agent also assumes responsibility to insert some information to correctly identify the customer to the DHCP server. This information is needed for the DHCP server to recognize customer credentials and to assign IP address(es) and/or configuration parameters accordingly. Additionally, the DHCP agent and some other nodes along the path between the server and the host also perform some snooping of addresses and parameters assigned to the customer. This snooping is performed to detect unauthorized attempts for service usages.
Because almost all of the abovementioned DHCP agent features are manually configurable, any one of these features can possibly lead to a service anomaly and/or a network anomaly. A service anomaly can be in the form of either serving customer below or over its SLA. Such anomalies may reveal themselves by a customer complaint, unless they are diagnosed proactively. For example, the operator can notice congestion in the network anomaly case. However, there might be many other reasons for similar service and network anomalies, only one of which is DHCP-related.
Presently, there are no available tools that provide for specifically facilitating DHCP diagnostics. To be useful, such a tool must diagnose any DHCP related issues that cause the anomalies mentioned above. Therefore, facilitating DHCP diagnostic functionality in a manner that determines if DHCP-related activities/configurations causing service and/or network anomalies would be advantageous, desirable and useful.